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Calif. Dem rips White House 'inaction'

“I’m incredibly disappointed in the lack of professionalism and lack of understanding shown by this agency. They don’t get it,” Cardoza said at the time. “For him to try to convince my folks, who are suffering on a daily basis, that he’s right because he’s read some statistics in Washington when he doesn’t get it, it’s really just absurd.”

Just as frustrating to Cardoza was Obama’s handling of the water crisis that had left the Central Valley’s farmlands parched. In one letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and then-Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, Cardoza pleaded for help, writing that he had “repeatedly called upon your departments to mitigate the devastating economic impacts of” court decisions that had altered water flow into the rich agricultural area.

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Like other moderate Blue Dogs, Cardoza has also found himself confronting the bitter reality of increasing political isolation. The Democrat clashed with Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over their push for a health care overhaul, refusing to sign onto the bill until the last moment. Earlier this year, Cardoza and neighboring California Rep. Jim Costa, a fellow Blue Dog, raised eyebrows when they refused to vote for Pelosi as House Democratic leader – instead casting votes for each other.

“They essentially felt they were getting a lot of lip service,” said one former House Democratic aide who was close to Cardoza. “They were frustrated with the leadership in the House and in the White House.”

The slow decline of the Blue Dog caucus weighed on Cardoza. After the 2010 midterm elections, their ranks were cut in half, dwindling from 54 to 25, and already this year two additional members, Oklahoma Rep. Dan Boren and Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross, have announced their retirements.

His own electoral fortunes also seemed to be threatened. Since defeating Condit, his former boss, in a 2002 primary, Cardoza had regularly cruised to easy reelection. But in 2010, Cardoza and Costa, his friend and ally, found themselves in heated races and under fire for what their opponents argued was their closeness to Obama and Pelosi and for their lack of progress in addressing the twin crises — housing and water — that had plagued their districts.

Given his strained relationship with the administration, the campaign trail criticism over the economic maelstrom was especially maddening for Cardoza.

“It only made his frustrations even more profound,” the former aide said.

Next year, Cardoza’s political prospects were not especially appealing: He faced the possibility of having to run against Costa after a bipartisan panel tasked with redrawing the state’s congressional map threw them into the same district.

In his Thursday statement, the California congressman concluded with this warning.

“After nearly 20 years in elected office, I offer this advice: Voters need to reward statesmanship. Too many Americans are losing faith in our government and our democracy,” he said. “For our country to change course, voters must aggressively punish extreme partisanship and rhetoric when they cast their ballots. The United States of America is too great a nation for us not to demand excellence in our leaders.”

Readers' Comments (110)

Actually, I'm going to make a departure from my popular signature Obama bashing and point out something most libbers might have missed in this article. Dennis Cardoza wouldn't have to worry about the housing in his district or the water for farms if he wasn't depending on the federal government. This is why we believe in state's rights. Let the states decide how and when they will handle local issues. The feds are just too big, too massive, too inefficient and ineffective to handle every problem that happens in the country. Me and Mrs. Neo regurlarly cry over the suffering of millions of people in Obama's economy. The real problem though, is ever turning the entire economy over to the Obama. Free the states, get the feds out of the way!

His office regularly flooded reporters’ in-boxes with statements and letters criticizing the administration over what he argued was its lack of care and interest in addressing home foreclosures.

Funny, I don't recall seeing or hearing any reporting on this prior to Mr. Cardoza's retirement announcement. The media loves to shield Obama from criticism as much as possible. However, America is waking up and so the media has no choice.

While it's hard to argue that a federal government or an administration can "solve" the housing crisis - it's not the government's role - it is important to link the inability of this administration to understand the need to have the federal government get out of the way, both in legislation/regulation and in rhetoric, and to create an environment where business and consumers have the confidence to grow. Obama tacking on regulation after regulation and daily, nauseatingly, droning on with class warfare and blame the banks, blame the rich, blame Bush, etc. leaves business with mountains of disincentive and consumers with a sense of hopelessness.

Housing in America was a ponzi scheme that will take the better part of a decade to repair, but you need a vibrant economy first.

“Looking back on disappointments, I am dismayed by the Administration’s failure to understand and effectively address the current housing foreclosure crisis,” Cardoza said in his statement. “Home foreclosures are destroying communities and crushing our economy, and the Administration’s inaction is infuriating.”

This EXACTLY why we need to hire Mitt Romney in 2012...............this liberal/progressive Administration is completely out of IDEAS..................most of Obama's economic advisers are back in their warm cozy liberal/progressive colleges and universities earning six-figure salaries and living the good-life.

Americans are giving up HOPE..................Americans are being divided everyday by Ideologues on both the Left and Right, mostly the Left........

We are headed in the wrong direction as a nation. Soon we will have to change our name to the "Divided States of America".

One thing is for sure we CAN NOT stay-the-course with Obama in 2012.

We MUST hire the most qualified candidate who can best address Jobs, economic growth, entitlement reform, balancing the Federal budget and repealing ObamaCare........

I have looked at ALL the candidates and one stands above all others when you look at his very successful cross-functional experience and results.............................Mitt Romney...................Romney will work long and hard to implement the right changes we need to get our nation and economy moving forward. And Romney will NOT engage in dividing the American people.

Join Team Romney we have room for EVERYONE in America.........................

We are headed in the wrong direction as a nation. Soon we will have to change our name to the "Divided States of America".

You have just made the case for President Obama's reelection. All the Republican presidential wannabes, your beloved Romney included, are running on the Republican platform of weakening and shrinking our federal government, while strengthening state's rights and freedoms. This twofold Republican approach will logically result in that very "Divided States of America" you rightly worry about.

Romney will work long and hard to implement the right changes we need to get our nation and economy moving forward.

Romney will "work long and hard," I believe. Look how long and hard he's worked to get that darned elusive Republican nomination. I like that about Romney. But I don't like the methods to boost our economy he has already laid out in his own work history and in his 59-point economic plan. He will double-down on shipping jobs overseas, on mass layoffs and downsizing. He will push to "unleash Wall Street" on US again. He has promised to strip protective regulations of the EPA and has promised to repeal the entire financial regulatory law that was created to protect US from another Wall Street crash and worldwide economic meltdown. He'll work long and hard, all right, but at the wrong things that will take US in the wrong direction -- toward Korporate Amerika.

Obama and his czars are all doing the wrong things. His action is killing jobs and not helping any of us. He office just authorized illegals the right to work and take american jobs. How in the world can that help american to work.?? He just imposed regulation on farmers to comply with dust regulation.This will shut them down. How will that help the farmers?? He killing jobs with that. He is against employers checking for illegals beforing hire someone. This will keep illegals from takeing American jobs. I appears to me that he think he president of the illegals and not america. Someone should tell him . He on the wrong side of issues. Maybe that is his plan.................... http://www.morningstartv.com/o...

House Democratic aides and party strategists, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said they were taken aback by the harshness of Cardoza’s message — he’s not known as a bomb-thrower — and couldn’t recall any recently departing member tossing such a grenade on their way out the door.

If this was a Republican Congressperson criticizing a Republican President, Alex would be using terms like ‘refreshingly candid’, ‘feisty’ , ‘a much needed critique’ and a ‘break from lockstep conformity’…etc…LOL

Cardoza appears to be so overwhelmingly angry that he is unable to think straight. He has been fighting with the White House since 2005 (when housing began its steep decline). As mentioned above, the housing situation is so deep that it will take years for it to work its way out of the mess it is in. And it predates President Obama back to 2005.

It appears that Cardoza feels helpless himself in his position to ease the situation and expects the White House to apply magic to fix it for him. And the water issue stems from court decisions and once again, he expects the White House to intervene with the courts for him. I don't think Salazar can overrule court decisions any better than Cardoza can.

Cardoza shows his humane side in empathy with his constituents, but his anger is not of a good kind, but a destructive one that renders him powerless to help. Best he is retiring, I think.

Romney will have no effective answers for the housing situation because there is no silver bullet that will quickly get that huge glut of houses resold. Only time will do so, and the new housing construction will continue to suffer until those houses are sold. This is what brought on the crisis--too many houses built and sold under iffy financial conditions.

Basically Cardoza, in his anger and frustration with no control over the situation, is lashing out at a scapegoat and has chosen the White House as his target.

Not all the states are in a housing crisis. My state is not. It is concentrated in a few major states, but it involves a lot of individual people. Some states had better laws that helped keep it under control. So it does, indeed, appear to be a state problem. How are states like Arizona, New Mexico, Florida dealing with this issue? I do agree on this that the states in trouble helped bring on this situation with lax laws and should be leading the charge on fixing it. But it is so much easier to blame the White House, now isn't it?

Just as frustrating to Cardoza was Obama’s handling of the water crisis that had left the Central Valley’s farmlands parched.

Gee Politico bury the real reason for the Central Valley's housing crisis on pg 2 and only 1 sentence. The radical envirnonmentalists have fought and won with the administration's help to divert water to "save" a fish, the 3 inch Delta smelt and have destroyed that area by withholding water from farmers and inflicted an unemployment and housing crisis has destroyed the community. Under this administration it is left with one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation which has hit the hispanic community the hardest. If a Republican politician had made such a statement against Bush or any Republican administration had sat around twiddling their thumbs while a community died this would have been a huge story in the LSM but there has been little news coverage for years and will be a non-story today. If Obama was a Republican La Raza would be protesting daily at the WH and the LSM would have been covering the story like they did Katrina.

“I’m incredibly disappointed in the lack of professionalism and lack of understanding shown by this agency. They don’t get it,” Cardoza said at the time. “For him to try to convince my folks, who are suffering on a daily basis, that he’s right because he’s read some statistics in Washington when he doesn’t get it, it’s really just absurd.”

Even the Occupy Wasted Spacers have begun to realize that Obama and the rest of the guvies should be the main target of their protests. TARP was supposed to remove the toxic assets in the bank’s portfolios but they could not arrive at a price. So they gave the money to banks to increase their liquidity and make their books look good so the multi-million dollar bonuses would not stop.

The toxic assets are still there…the foreclosures are still there…the problem is still unsolved…

An Interior Department official said Thursday the agency will ask independent experts to review allegations by a federal judge that the testimony of two department scientists was so inconsistent and contradictory it amounted to deliberate deception.

U.S. District Court Judge Oliver Wanger attacked the credibility of the biologists last month shortly before retiring from the bench. At a hearing on a motion in a court case involving delta smelt protections, Wanger called one of the scientists a "zealot" and accused the agency of engaging in "bad faith."

Yes it is when the Obama administration runs the Interior Dept that helped block the water to the Central Valley region. LOL but not surprised you didn't know about it since the MSM has a media blackout of most stories that show how Obama's policies are job killers.

Wanger criticized written testimony by fish biologists Frederick V. Feyrer of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and Jennifer M. Norris of the USF&WS. He accused Norris of not being honest with the court. “I find her testimony to be that of a zealot. And I’m not overstating the case. I’m not being histrionic. I’m not being dramatic.” He said that the federal government had acted in “bad faith.”

However, in February the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, which oversees the Central Valley Project, announced farmers south of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta would receive no water. In the end, residents received a drastically reduced amount.

Westlands, which receives all of its water from the CVP, serves about 50,000 people in western Fresno and Kings counties, most of whom depend on agriculture. In March, Westlands and the San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority, an organization that represents CVP water users and of which Westlands is a member, sued the U.S. Department of the Interior, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.

This policy began in 2009 under Obama with little MSM coverage and the Congressman's frustration is understandable.

And in a nutshell, shows the impossible predicament that Obie is in. He can't do anything to convince the right he isn't their enemy( he burned that bridge long ago), he can't run on his accomplishments, cause they aren't really that great, he can't buy votes, cause he created such a backlash in 2010, that he lost the house, so he can't get anything passed. He can't make deals, cause he's an empty suit, wholly unfit for the job. The only thing left is to continue to play the race card and try to blame everyone else, both of which wore thin long ago.........as things are going, I don't care if he is re-elected, with a republican majority in the house and senate, the only thing he accomplish would be done by mandate which will cause congress to impeach him for overstepping his power pretty early on, which will probably swing the country even more republican in the next election....

But hey, don't dis this guy or his "army of sqautters" might come crap on your lawn.....

You need to stick with accurate accusations, not a load of bull. When you bring up the dust regulation, which is not even being considered by the government, as already being in place, you lose all credibility.

How is President Obama advocating for employers NOT checking on citizenship? This is a longstanding law that is HAS to be done. Do you have a job? If so, you would have had to supply defined identification that proves you are legally a citizen or allowed to work in the US. President Obama is obligated to uphold all existing federal laws. Raids are still being done on offenders, but the law needs to be stiffened on offending employers.

If you really want to help the farmers, especially those growing fruits and vegetables, you would be demanding immigration reform that allows for legal work programs to let in those who help in harvesting. These do not take jobs from Americans. Last time we had a crisis in not letting these workers in, farmers were desperate because they did not have the workers to harvest. They advertised for help and even used employment agencies. One guy did all that and got exactly ONE worker. These are hard jobs.

An added plus to immigration reform done right is that businesses will find it hard to illegally employ undocumented workers and therefore everybody (including the employer) will be paying taxes.

Breach of political etiquette??? Alex, have you not heard the verbal sewage flowing from the congress, president and their mouthpieces the in the past two years? Did you just awake from a coma?

LOL It all goes back to the Dems calling Bush and our soldiers traitors, liars and murderers years ago in Congress and NO MSM outrage over those breaches of political etiquette. Heck they praised Obama for going overseas and trashing Bush and his policies while running for President which was the last standard of political etiquette. Funny how they only get their panties twisted in a knot when target of a breach of political etiquette is Obama or the Democrats. Funny how they always find a way to criticize a Democrat dissenter of Democrat policies in a story but when a Republican dissenter targets a Republican they use terms like "maverick" or call his commentary honest and forthright with no other Republican quotes used in the story to deflect the comment. This is how media bias works.

I hate to be the veritable poop in the punchbowl here, but the foreclosure mess won't be fixed until we have JOBS. And we are not going to have those until idiots like Harry "government jobs are more important than private sector jobs" Reid and the Marxist/Corporatist-in-Chief are removed from power. Unless and until the federal government gets the hell out of our way, there will be no more job creation. What's happening right now is EXACTLY what happened during the Great Depression, for EXACTLY the same reasons.

So, whey didnt he go after the GOP who have brought this country to a virtual standstill these past 6 years? OR for deliberately creating this debt crisis? OR for crashing the economy then blocking the recovery??

he’s not known as a bomb-thrower — and couldn’t recall any recently departing member tossing such a grenade on their way out the door.

In the world of Politico, if Obama acts angry and frustrated, he is portrayed as ‘feisty’. If one of Obama’s critics is generally angry and frustrated they are a thrower of flames, bombs and grenades. Stories from Politico:

Oct. 4, 2011 - Story... confrontational tone of President Obama's speech in Mesquite, Texas today. The White House just released prepared excerpts that preview a feisty Obama appearance in the geographic heart of the Republican Party

Sep. 28, 2011 - Story... of President Barack Obama’s deficit-reduction plan or his new feisty tone.

Sep. 21, 2011 - StoryObama unveiled his deficit plan Monday during a feisty address in the White House Rose Garden